“It may vary slightly according to the population you are serving, but the rule of a small number of people costing the bulk of the money is true in every population in the U.S,” explains Glaseroff, co-founder of the Stanford Coordinated Care Clinic and clinical professor of medicine at Stanford University.

To help doctors more effectively care for their high-needs patients, the Intensive Outpatient Care Program (IOCP) embeds care coordinators in medical practices. According to Glaseroff, a family physician who created IOCP with colleagues, this model not only reduces health expenditures, but promotes patient empowerment by addressing the reasons why they haven’t been doing well.

IOCP was further developed by Boeing, the California Public Employees Retirement System and Pacific Gas and Electric Company, members of the Pacific Business Group on Health (PBGH), a coalition of 65 employer purchasers. PBGH coordinates programs including the Purchaser Value Network, an organization that promotes value-based purchasing of healthcare.

IOCP recently concluded a three-year demonstration pilot funded by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation involving 23 practices, 500 physicians, and 15,000 patients. The program is now being adopted by PBGH members.

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